Optimum determination of speckle size to be used in electronic speckle pattern interferometry

Characteristics of the fringe pattern detected by an electronic speckle pattern interferometer, in conditions in which a test object deforms in an arbitrary direction and the speckle intensity is detected over a pixel area in the TV camera to be used, have been investigated from two aspects: speckle noise reduction and fringe contrast. The main result is that the fringes are obtained with high contrast and low speckle noise, if the speckle size is selected by the optical system so as to be smaller than the pixel size. This result is applicable to highly accurate measurements of the out-of-plane displacements of the test object, whose in-plane displacement is small.